WHAT WE CAN LEARN FROM MEN IN BLACK ABOUT 2008

Nope, this is not an alien joke like Alien Al, much less one regarding the PIAPS, who was born only 3½ months after Roswell.

It is about the history lesson taught so arrestingly by Tommy Lee Jones as Agent K in Men In Black.

2008 is going to be a stressful year for a lot of folks.  The fate of America, the fate of Western Civilization, the fate of mankind, will be decided this year – as far as folks who enjoy being Drama Queens are concerned.

As we plunge forward into the fateful unknown of 2008, let us, then, take a deep, calming breath and listen to the soothing words of Agent K.

His partner, Agent J played by Will Smith, is freaking out as a newbie man-in-black, unglued over the alien threat that will destroy the Earth in the next half-hour.

Agent J:  Man, we ain't got time for this…  I don't know whether or not you've forgotten, but there's an Arquillian Battle Cruiser that's about to…

Agent K: Kid, there's always an Arquillian Battle Cruiser, or a Corillian Death Ray, or an intergalactic plague that is about to wipe out all life on this little planet, and the only way these people can get on with their happy lives is that they… do… not… know about it!

Welcome to the history of the world.

The more you read and understand history over the vast human panorama of six thousand years of civilization (starting in Mesopotamia in ca. 4000 BC), or the more history you've actually lived through, the more perspective you gain on the present, and the more you dismiss predictions of catastrophe for the future.

I'd like to show you a picture taken in what is today the focus of all America, Iowa:

  
Three generations of Wheelers are buried in the Rose Hill Cemetery in Mechanicsville, Iowa.  From left to right:

My great-great grandfather Charles Truman Wheeler (1806-1874) and his wife Ettalinda (1808-1895), my great-grandfather Charles Earl Wheeler (1851-1927) and his wife Ella (1855-1932), and my grandfather Lucien Charles Wheeler (1878-1950). 

(Next to Lucien is his brother Jeffrey, 1889-1948;  his wife Flora and both my parents are interred at Forest Lawn in Glendale, California.)

At the start of Charles Truman's life, Europe was slaughtering itself in a debauch of death.  The Napoleonic Wars from 1799 to 1815 killed over six million soldiers and civilians.  When a young boy, the British Army burned down the White House and sacked Washington DC in the War of 1812.  At the end of his life, he saw his country tear itself apart in a maniacally murderous Civil War.

Charles Earl witnessed the horror of the Civil War as a young boy and that of the Great War (World War One) when old, a war in which his son Jeffrey was poison gassed by the Germans in France, crippling him for life.

Lucien, as the Chief of the Secret Service Presidential Bodyguard, watched over the lives of four presidents (there's a picture of him with Teddy Roosevelt in Chavez in Chile).  He witnessed up close and personal World War One, the Great Depression, World War Two – and saw at the end of his life an America stronger and more prosperous than ever.

So – do you think they are rolling in their graves over what America has become today, over the threats and dangers America faces this year and in those to come?

Not a chance.  They are shaking their heads wearily and saying to us, "Whatever problems and threats you face now, they are a walk in the park compared to those we knew, so would you please be quiet and let us rest in peace!"

This is not to carelessly dismiss the danger to America of the PIAPS as POTUS, or of Islamocrazies and other apocalypses.  It is to put the history we are living through today in perspective.  It is to know that there has been, is now, and always will be some form of Arquillian Battle Cruiser-Corillian Death Ray threat to deal with.

And it is to know that there are never ideal silver-bullet solutions to magic-wand them away. 

Which means not pining for a Prince Charming to come riding on a white horse and rescue us from the scary dragons like we're fairy tale princesses.  Reality predicts that we're going to end up with at best far and frustratingly less than glittering perfection in the White House next year, and quite possibly something truly awful.

But no matter what happens, we and America will get through it.  Trust me on this.  Trust America on this. 

2008 is going to be weird roller-coaster year.  Victories and disasters, hopes fulfilled and dashed.  Iowans deal what may be a mortal blow to an evil witch and pump up a Preacher Boy Socialist at the same time.  Every week from now on may bring something exciting and something scary.

So we need to be like Agent K, not Agent J until he learned to keep his calm in a never-ending struggle.  The battle will never be over.  The liberals, the fascists of the left, the forces of darkness, will never give up trying to pick our pockets, seize our freedoms, and diminish our humanity.

So neither must we ever give up, ever get disillusioned, ever panic and freak out.  Stay resolute, stay determined, stay optimistic, and stay cool.  Sleep well, for the struggle continues tomorrow – and every day after.  What matters in life is never giving up.